You couldn't have planned it this way!
Sep. 2nd, 2007 08:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexpgpSo there's this part of me that says it'd be a lowdown thing to show up to church late, especially to a Russian Orthodox service, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
My parents have never been very sociable people, but the friends they made were solid. So it was with the case of Mr. and Mrs. G, who live in Port Washington. I really don't know much about the family, except that he is a retired schoolteacher (who, by the looks of it, is still teaching despite the steady deterioration of his physical condition associated with aging, as evidenced by his "Hey, hang on a second, I've got to get something out of the car for one of the kids I'm tutoring" remark today) and she, it is said, comes from a line of European nobility. Back in the day, the two of them (and their kids) moonlighted at night cleaning office buildings.
They attend a Russian Orthodox church in Glen Cove, and after the service, they generally stop by to visit the old man to see how he's doing. When I called them yesterday to tell them he'd been transferred to rehab, the return call came with an invitation to attend the service.
To an outsider, Russian Orthodox services are a mystery. They are conducted in a language called Old Church Slavonic, which sorta-kinda resembles Russian, but is different. I would only underscore my ignorance by trying to characterize the service past the obvious points, but one unmistakable observation the outsider will come away with is that there are (officially) no pews in the church, and hence, no places for people to sit for the duration of the service, which today lasted about 2 hours.
By "officially," I mean to say that there were chairs strategically placed to allow some of the older attendees to sit at today's service, though as far as I could see, everyone made it to their feet at certain appointed times in the service (I can make out the Slavonic version of the Lord's Prayer, which is one of those times). In the end, the message conveyed was a solid one. The service, apparently, had something to do with the start of the school year, and in his remarks after the liturgy, the priest made a point of stressing how important it was for parents, grandparents, and the church community to guide and contribute to the education of its youth in parallel to what the secular world provided.
When I arrived a the church at 9:30 am, there were perhaps 10 people there, and I was, if not the youngest, then very nearly the youngest in the crowd, if memory serves. (That in itself is unusual enough, these days.) When the priest made his appearance, I most certainly lost that distinction. Folks kept arriving as the service progressed, and by the end of the service, there were perhaps 40 people in the church, some with children and infants. Overall, the service wasn't what one might expect in a Methodist church, but the people - even if they tended toward the geriatric side - most definitely fit the pattern.
After the service, I took off for the Glen Cove Hospital to visit the old man. Since I didn't know what room he was in, I stopped at the vistor's desk and gave my dad's name.
"Sorry," said the security guard, "there's nobody here by that name."
Whoa!
"I'm sorry, perhaps I didn't make myself clear. Let me spell the name for you," I said, and did so, phonetically.
"Nope," came the reply, "there's no such person here."
A few moments later, I'm talking to the nurse who called me yesterday to tell me my dad was going back to the hospital.
"Your dad was transferred to the Manhasset Hospital this morning," she said.
This general state of affairs is beginning to annoy me. Aside from yesterday's call (whose intended recipient was my late mother, BTW), I'm getting the full mushroom treatment (kept in the dark, etc.). Why do I have to root around to find stuff like this out?
In any event, the G's had not yet arrived at Glen Cove Hospital, so I scrawled a note, left it with the visitor's desk, and set off for the North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, via the church (to update the G's, assuming the G's hadn't left the church yet).
They hadn't. I explained the situation, and then took off for Manhasset. Along the way, I learned there was a Whole Foods market near the Benihana restaurant on Northern Boulevard where Galina, the kids and I celebrated a wedding anniversary (15th?) way back when.
The North Shore Hospital is housed at a huge campus, and after parking in the wrong area (the garage was closed for repairs), I elected to use "valet" parking near the main entrance so I could pop in and visit the old man. He is very happy to have been transferred here, as the joint has an excellent reputation. I don't know what, if anything, will be done prior to Tuesday, but I figure if he's happy, I'm happy.
Since coming home, I've taken a nap and spoken with both Galina and Natalie.
There are still 845 words left in the current job, and it's nearly 12 hours later. Overall, that's no big deal, as I ought to be able to handle the rest of the current job tonight and manage the other job between tomorrow and Tuesday.
Onward!
Cheers...
My parents have never been very sociable people, but the friends they made were solid. So it was with the case of Mr. and Mrs. G, who live in Port Washington. I really don't know much about the family, except that he is a retired schoolteacher (who, by the looks of it, is still teaching despite the steady deterioration of his physical condition associated with aging, as evidenced by his "Hey, hang on a second, I've got to get something out of the car for one of the kids I'm tutoring" remark today) and she, it is said, comes from a line of European nobility. Back in the day, the two of them (and their kids) moonlighted at night cleaning office buildings.
They attend a Russian Orthodox church in Glen Cove, and after the service, they generally stop by to visit the old man to see how he's doing. When I called them yesterday to tell them he'd been transferred to rehab, the return call came with an invitation to attend the service.
To an outsider, Russian Orthodox services are a mystery. They are conducted in a language called Old Church Slavonic, which sorta-kinda resembles Russian, but is different. I would only underscore my ignorance by trying to characterize the service past the obvious points, but one unmistakable observation the outsider will come away with is that there are (officially) no pews in the church, and hence, no places for people to sit for the duration of the service, which today lasted about 2 hours.
By "officially," I mean to say that there were chairs strategically placed to allow some of the older attendees to sit at today's service, though as far as I could see, everyone made it to their feet at certain appointed times in the service (I can make out the Slavonic version of the Lord's Prayer, which is one of those times). In the end, the message conveyed was a solid one. The service, apparently, had something to do with the start of the school year, and in his remarks after the liturgy, the priest made a point of stressing how important it was for parents, grandparents, and the church community to guide and contribute to the education of its youth in parallel to what the secular world provided.
When I arrived a the church at 9:30 am, there were perhaps 10 people there, and I was, if not the youngest, then very nearly the youngest in the crowd, if memory serves. (That in itself is unusual enough, these days.) When the priest made his appearance, I most certainly lost that distinction. Folks kept arriving as the service progressed, and by the end of the service, there were perhaps 40 people in the church, some with children and infants. Overall, the service wasn't what one might expect in a Methodist church, but the people - even if they tended toward the geriatric side - most definitely fit the pattern.
After the service, I took off for the Glen Cove Hospital to visit the old man. Since I didn't know what room he was in, I stopped at the vistor's desk and gave my dad's name.
"Sorry," said the security guard, "there's nobody here by that name."
Whoa!
"I'm sorry, perhaps I didn't make myself clear. Let me spell the name for you," I said, and did so, phonetically.
"Nope," came the reply, "there's no such person here."
A few moments later, I'm talking to the nurse who called me yesterday to tell me my dad was going back to the hospital.
"Your dad was transferred to the Manhasset Hospital this morning," she said.
This general state of affairs is beginning to annoy me. Aside from yesterday's call (whose intended recipient was my late mother, BTW), I'm getting the full mushroom treatment (kept in the dark, etc.). Why do I have to root around to find stuff like this out?
In any event, the G's had not yet arrived at Glen Cove Hospital, so I scrawled a note, left it with the visitor's desk, and set off for the North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, via the church (to update the G's, assuming the G's hadn't left the church yet).
They hadn't. I explained the situation, and then took off for Manhasset. Along the way, I learned there was a Whole Foods market near the Benihana restaurant on Northern Boulevard where Galina, the kids and I celebrated a wedding anniversary (15th?) way back when.
The North Shore Hospital is housed at a huge campus, and after parking in the wrong area (the garage was closed for repairs), I elected to use "valet" parking near the main entrance so I could pop in and visit the old man. He is very happy to have been transferred here, as the joint has an excellent reputation. I don't know what, if anything, will be done prior to Tuesday, but I figure if he's happy, I'm happy.
Since coming home, I've taken a nap and spoken with both Galina and Natalie.
There are still 845 words left in the current job, and it's nearly 12 hours later. Overall, that's no big deal, as I ought to be able to handle the rest of the current job tonight and manage the other job between tomorrow and Tuesday.
Onward!
Cheers...
